"It came as a shock to all of us, we never saw it coming," he remembers. "It shouldn't have happened either. The government just flat-out over-reacted."

Until the events of that fateful day, the year had been going rather well. The Rolling Stones had released Exile on Main Street. The average price of a house was $27,000. The Kodak pocket camera had just been introduced, Wrangler jeans were selling for $12.

Yes, things were going well. Then came the last days of September, when the leaves were changing and the federal government strode heavily into the lives of Canadian children everywhere.

September 27, 1972 - the day Canada banned firecrackers.

"We didn't think it was possible," says Whyte, whose family business, J.G. Whyte and Son, has been in the wholesale fireworks business in Ottawa since 1855. "We had about 30 wooden crates of firecrackers when the ban came down.

"We hung onto those crates for years, waiting for the government to change its mind. We finally had to destroy them, got them buried special in a dump. I almost cried."

It is tough for Whyte this time of year - the Victoria Day long weekend. For many of us, Victoria Day used to be Firecracker Day. The busiest time of the year for J. G. Whyte and Sons.

Young boys would buy firecrackers - lady fingers and tiger stripes - by the bag. Nickels and dimes would be saved up for months, in preparation of Victoria Day. It had been that way for more than a century.

Then overnight the federal government made administrative changes to the Canada Explosives Act and that was it. The tradition was dead.

Energy Minister Donald McDonald said the ban was long overdue. The Canadian Association of Consumers was delighted. The association said it was fighting "all dangerous products and this is one of the most dangerous."

The firecracker. The toy of choice on the Victoria Day long Weekend for more than a century, suddenly one of this country's most dangerous products.

At the time, some found it amusing the Consumers Association would target firecrackers as something dangerous yet had nothing to say about cigarettes on the shelves, Shelby Mustangs on the road or Paul McCartney in the recording studio.

Others found it galling when, several months after the ban, it came out the children who had been badly burned while playing with firecrackers in their tent - the news story that started everything - was wrong, and that the children had actually been smoking.

Not wanting to tell their parents, they said they had been playing with firecrackers.

"When that came out, I thought for sure the government would re-think things," says Whyte. "I mean, how can you ban firecrackers? What's Victoria Day without firecrackers, right?"

But by then it was too late. Too many important people had come out and called firecrackers dangerous. Lady fingers had become something evil in this country - not something celebratory - and the ban stuck.

Whyte thinks children lost something because of our overreaction 38 years ago. The sense of adventure and play that used to come on Firecracker Day, he doesn't see it as much in today's children.

I think he has a point. I can still remember the thrill of heading out the front door on Victoria Day morning, my pockets stuffed with lady fingers. (My dad even bought them for me. Can you imagine?)

I'd set them off with other boys in the forest near our school, or in sand boxes, where we'd blow up plastic soldiers at the same time. (Yes, we did that.)

We never had any adult supervision, and yes, I've seen someone get a singed finger. To this day, I think that's how you learn not to get burned in life. By having it happen to you once.

Sadly, the government of the day 38 years ago saw things differently. This might even have been the start, the clearly defined and easily tracked beginning, of the Nanny State.

September 27, 1972. The day Canada banned firecrackers.

"It's still a sad day, if you ask me," says Whyte. "I don't think Victoria Day has been the same since."